The Brewery Adventure
Do you love breweries and tap rooms? Well, we do. We love the beer of course, but this podcast is more about the spaces themselves. What makes a great brewery experience? We explore breweries around Minnesota and beyond to discover our favorites. Join us for The Brewery Adventure!
The Brewery Adventure
Get Ready to Dabble!
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The 2026 Winter Beer Dabbler is almost here! To get dabble-ready, we sat down with Sam Steen, the Duke of Dabbling himself, to spill all the juicy details about this year’s fest on Saturday, February 21st at the State Fairgrounds in St. Paul.
Haven’t grabbed tickets yet? Do Sam (and his stress levels) a solid and snag them early at beerdabbler.com/winter-beer-dabbler.
🚨Hot tip alert!! Sam makes some bold promises about what he’ll do for anyone who shows up rocking blue crabs on a snacklace. Someone needs to make this happen.
LINKS:
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Welcome to the Brewery Adventure. I'm Courtney.
SPEAKER_07And I'm Dan. We're here to dive into the world of your local brewery.
SPEAKER_01It's not just about the beer, it's about the five, the people, and the stories behind every tap room.
SPEAKER_07From small neighborhood spots to big bustling brew houses, we'll bring you along for the ride. So grab a pint and join us on the brewery adventure. Cheers. All right.
SPEAKER_02That was lovely.
SPEAKER_07Bingo.
SPEAKER_00Oh, thank you.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. It's usually just the two of us that get to marvel at how well we ping pong back and forth.
SPEAKER_01I kind of hold my breath through the whole thing, and then when we get to the end, I'm like, oh, okay, we made it.
SPEAKER_07And nothing blew up this time.
SPEAKER_01Well, welcome to the brewery adventure. We have a very special guest with us here today. We have Sam with the beer dabbler. I am the Dabbler guy. The Dabbler guy.
SPEAKER_02The Dabbler guy. The Duke of Dabbling. The Duke of Diddle. Ooh, I like that. There you go.
SPEAKER_07That was a little bit more. That looked good on a bumper sticker.
SPEAKER_01I was going to go dabbler dude, but I like the Duke of Dabbling. Duke of Dabbling. Yeah. Yeah, that's fantastic. What is your actual title if you have one? If it's not just it's funny.
SPEAKER_02Technically, I am the events and operations coordinator. So like with the Dabbler depot here at the liquor store, I might assist with operations, but my full-time specific goal is putting on our winter beer dabbler and our pride beer dabbler. And then now the doobie dabbler, our cannabis festival.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And one of those is coming up very, very shortly.
SPEAKER_02Yes, it's two weeks away. I'm so excited, but also, oh, these two weeks are awful for me emotionally. Because I'm just like, have I done everything I need to do? Did I dot my I's cross my T's? And then like you get to it and you're like, oh, it's fine. I don't know why I'm such an anxious person.
SPEAKER_01It's a good, no, it that's a good anxious though. It's an anxious because you care. It's an anxious because I put all this stuff together and I just want it to be magical for everyone.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's it's like that. It's like, I don't know, you really do like when you I don't know if I'm allowed to cuss on this, but you can't. When you give a fuck about like what you do, and like you know how it reflects on you as a person, your work ethic, and you're like, I have all these people together. You know, we have all these breweries, all these other vendors, these food trucks. And it's like if I screw this, like I feel so bad. Like if someone has a bad experience, I'm like, damn, like part of that's my fault because I just didn't lock in hard enough or whatever. And so, like, that anxiety is just like I want to make sure it's not gonna happen, but I want to make sure a hundred percent of the people there have a good time and it's a win for everyone.
SPEAKER_01I can't imagine not having a good time.
SPEAKER_02I mean, uh who are these people? You should hear about some of the reviews we get like in my inbox after an event, because like they'll email info at dabbler, and I'm the one who gets it, and they'll be like, um, there were too many interesting cheeseburger IPAs at the beer festival, um, and not enough Coors Light. And you're like, Hmm. Oh, it is a beer festival. Um, you also I didn't force you to drink it. You could have just said no.
SPEAKER_07That's where they get you. That's insane. Yeah, it's fun.
SPEAKER_02You get wacky reviews, not enough porta potties, um, not enough domestic beer, or we didn't have enough cider, you know, that type of stuff. Um, some people say it was too cold, and it's like, ah man, why didn't you think about that? Yeah, I really should have, you know, I should have gotten on the phone with the weather.
SPEAKER_07Did you email Mother Nature to be like, hey, can we get a 40 minutes? My boss on that. Yeah. Jesus, that's crazy.
SPEAKER_01I that that makes sense. I I can't. It's funny.
SPEAKER_02You learn to live with that type of thing, you're just like, okay, I can't please you. But like, you know, if a vendor comes to you and is like, hey, this wasn't a win for us, you're like, damn, or like a especially if it's like a brewery, just because we're such a tight-knit community here in Minnesota, in the greater Midwest, you're like, damn, like that's a that's like my friend, you know, who I've developed a relationship with. And if they didn't have a win, it's like, well, shit, let me call them up right now and figure out how we can get this better, you know.
SPEAKER_01So you the winter beer dabbler started in 2008. I think so, yeah.
SPEAKER_02It's yeah, it's this is the 16th winter beer dabbler. Like this baby can drive now. Like it's 16. I this is like 2010. Yeah, it's it's it's 16. It's the 16th beer dabbler. I mean, it started by Matt Kennavan. Um, he's kind of this is his brainchild, and then he slowly, I mean, he grew it into something that's just like a staple, you know. When I like it's funny, when I moved here in Minnesota, I didn't know what it was. And then when I started doing when I started working here at the Dabbler Depot and I started looking into it, and I was like, oh my gosh, this name is like a household name. You know, I'm at Goodwill and I see Dabbl glasses.
SPEAKER_07I th I'm pretty sure just because I know several other regional beer writers, beer influencers who come here, I think it's like the largest outdoor winter beer festival in the country.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I would bet.
SPEAKER_07Don't quote me on that, but that I have heard that phrase bandied about.
SPEAKER_01I wouldn't argue with that because who else is gonna hang out in the winter like we do?
SPEAKER_02I like try to talk to my family on the East Coast. I'm like, yeah, it's outside in February in Minnesota. And they're like, Outside in Minnesota in February? What are you doing? Like And it's just like we figured out. We figured out, you know, we got we got ways to warm ourselves.
SPEAKER_01Last year was my very first winter beer. Awesome. It was my first beer festival ever. We we talk about this quite a bit on the podcast, but for as cold as I was last year, anytime I said something about, oh, I'm cold, I would get a chorus of, oh man, you should have been here this one other year. Uh-huh.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. When I was getting hip to like this job, people were like, dude, this one year we were duct taping hand warmers to tap lines. It's like we lost a couple people, like we still haven't found them. It's like crazy stuff.
SPEAKER_07Mystique of the car the Carneland, the midway at the state fair.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, the midway at the state fair.
SPEAKER_01But that is a way to tolerate it, I guess. Like it's not cold this year because it was cold last year.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's like, you know, the cycle. I mean, we've luckily, luckily had like some pretty warm days, or like I don't know, like my media guy Jordan, he was like, last year was like 32 to like 28 degrees all day, and that's like perfect for a winter festival. And like 2024, it was like around 40 degrees, and like I was like, I was taking off layers just walking around the event.
SPEAKER_01I mean, last year it was gorgeous because the the temperature wasn't too bad, but it was very, very sunny. Yeah, so it was sunny. It was beautiful.
SPEAKER_02But you had a good time.
SPEAKER_01I really think it was a it was a turning point for me in my beer career. Beautiful. It I I walked away from that event just being like so inspired and so excited about beer. I was excited about beer before that, but there was like a new level of beer enthusiasm after that event.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and I come from a part of the country where beer isn't like huge like it is here in the Midwest. And so my first dabbler, I was like, oh, I get it now, you know, like I connected the dots. I was like, this culture is wacky and zany and for everyone.
SPEAKER_01And there, there were so many people there. I was not expecting the amount of people. Again, it's a it's a day outside in Minnesota in February. I'm like, there's not gonna be that many people there. No, no, oh my gosh.
SPEAKER_07That's a big draw. Yeah, what how many tickets do you typically sell?
SPEAKER_02I it it fluctuates. I mean, at like our height, it was like 15,000 people. I mean, but right now, like we really do coast at like around the 10,000 person hedge park, you know, just on that midway. And then there's the Coliseum. This year the Coliseum's closed, it's under renovations by the state fair. So it's all the people are just gonna be jam, everything's gonna be jam-packed in the midway. It's gonna be not claustrophobic, but confident. Cozy, cozy.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. How long have you been doing the Winter Bear Dabbler event then?
SPEAKER_02I've been with the Dabbler company for three years now. When I moved here to the Twin Cities in 2023 in June, and I had I was kind of bartending, and then I needed, you know, another job to supplement my income. So I started working here at the Dabbler Depot. Um, just as like one of their sales guys, you know, I talked about beer or spirits or wine, and then we did our 2024 winter beer dabbler, and that's when Gillian Hiscock was still our events coordinator. She's now doing a bar of their own. Um, and I was, you know, I was just on event day. I was like, this is awesome. I really like it. And I told Matt that I was just I was really interested in Dabbler and Friends and assisting in the Dabbler and Friends nonprofit side of stuff, but I was just curious about events. After Gillian left to do a bar of their own, Matt sits me down and I was kind of folk in charge of events just here. I'd been promoted to just events here at the depot, and he said, I want you to do the festivals. And I I very gingerly was like, I do not like a liberal arts degree, man. I dropped out of law school. Like, I like I don't think I have the experience for that. I want this to be a win for the company. And like if I'm taking stock of who I am, like I don't know, like if you want me to like assist with it more until I get the chops for it, like I'd be open to it. And he just went, shh, shut the fuck up. You're fucking doing it. And I just didn't say no. This bearded man with like a sleeve of tattoos.
SPEAKER_07He can be pretty intimate.
SPEAKER_02He's an intimidating guy, Matt Genovan. He's a sweetheart, but you're like, oh my God. And he's just like, You're doing it. And now I've just been doing it. It's just kind of like hit the ground running. I was in charge of pride immediately. And then after pride, we started doing doobie, and then from doobie, it's back into winter and then back into pride and then back into doobie again. So this is my second winter where I've planned it all the way through. I've done pride twice and I've done doobie twice. So I have six of the festivals under my belt now, and I've just been like, we're growing in so many different ways, and it's just cool to be a part of it.
SPEAKER_01Are you feeling more confident in it now? Like, oh I got this. This is my.
SPEAKER_02And now it's just changing dates, uh, getting a little bit more specific about stuff, being like, oh, we didn't really need that. We can cut that from the event, or we could that was a really big thing. People really liked it. We should make that bigger. You know, I even keep I keep little notes in the spreadsheets of like how it was received by my guests, you know, to make sure that I can really engage with it. Like the nights last year in the Coliseum, the Twin Cities Wyvern's, one of the best installations that like we've done. The reviews are insane, and now it's like I can't do a festival without these guys being being there.
SPEAKER_01You know, I saw them at a different brewery doing like an event out in the parking lot. They they were amazing. It was so much fun.
SPEAKER_02Matt and his crew are awesome people.
SPEAKER_07They're really so for people who uh didn't go last year, what what uh explain I didn't see them at the Dabbler last year, so I'm assuming it was the same thing, but you go ahead.
SPEAKER_02We worked with what they're called the Twin Cities Wyvern's. Uh they're part of the Minnesota Armored Combat Association. These guys dress up in period accurate medieval armor in an arena. It's the coolest. How did I miss that? It was in the Coliseum, dude. Some people don't make their way to the Coliseum, you know, they just like they the beer, the real heavy beer heads are just like down the line, and then it's like, all right, events over, and they're like, oh shit. Like, but yeah, they and then they fight full out.
SPEAKER_08That's really cool.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Um, yeah, it's it's like for me, I was just like, oh, for this, like, yeah, let's get them in there. People drink some beer, they watch these guys fight, and they'll do big battles. It's not 1v1, it's like 8v8.
SPEAKER_06They'll do a V1. Oh, that's interesting.
SPEAKER_02Okay, yeah, it's like 8v8 or like 1v2, and like they're just the biggest sweethearts. The cool thing about the Tennessee's Wyverns is they have the highest percentage of like femme fighters in the area. There's a lot of women who get involved with it, and they're really welcoming to women doing it, the LGBTQ community doing it. And so it's like a diverse group of just like DD nerds who are very, very athletic.
SPEAKER_01That's awesome. And they're really approachable. Like, you can go up to them and ask them about their armor pieces, and they will have like tell you like I'm borrowing this from this person. This I bought, and it costs this much money. They're like crazy expensive armor pieces.
SPEAKER_07I can imagine.
SPEAKER_01But they're they're just really it's it's fun to watch them and it's fun to be able to talk to them about what they're doing. Okay. Yeah.
SPEAKER_07I mean, it's so hard to, and I even go, luckily, because you know, Sam and everybody here at the Beer Dabbler Association is really nice and really welcoming with those of us who get media passes. We can come in early. And even when I come in early, I'm like, I got like three quarters of the way. I have to start in one place and go in order because I'm weird that way. But I don't make it to the Coliseum every year. Yeah. And so, like, I'm like, oh, what? I didn't even know about that. So that's cool.
SPEAKER_02I think uh it being consolidated might help us a little bit simply because there's I don't know, like at Doobie Dabbler, the footpin's huge, and I'm running across that field solving problems. And so then I think about it from a guest perspective. I'm like, my feet hurt, their feet definitely have to hurt. Like, you know, I might have started at 6 a.m. that day and they got here at one o'clock, but like it is hard to get to see everything, and then there's that fear of missing out, you know, like, oh shit, my friend's talking about this. I mean, for us, it's like, yeah, come back next year, you know. But also, it's like, damn, I want you to see everything. You know, my team puts in such hard work. I want to make sure that that this beautiful zany picture of fire shooting in the air, motocross are seen by everyone and they don't feel like they missed out everything because the beer is there, you know. You will get plenty of beer. Right. But like no shortage of that. There's no shortage, but like we want you to enjoy like the culture for brewing is weird here, but it's also homegrown and it's approachable. And you know, you don't have to, it's kind of like a misfit energy in like a really good way. I like that misfit energy. I like that a lot. Yeah, it's what drew me to the energy the industry here in Minnesota. I was just like, you know, I love it. I just love it.
SPEAKER_01What kind of events are gonna be happening at the Dabbler this year?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, then we brought in a group, it's called Fowling. Basically, it's like bowling but with footballs. Um, it's like one of those things, like it's what could go wrong. It's propped up and people are like really into it. Shannon Blowtorch will be there DJing again, and then the Science Museum, who's also gonna be on all of our glassware, is putting on an installation, like a science-y kind of interactive thing at their booth along the midway. Uh yeah, yeah. Or the hot air balloon thing is gonna be there again. Yes, those guys will definitely be. I mean, it's so perfect. It's like, oh, that's also like you take a photo and you see fire, you're like, that's a great like piece to like put on your socials, but also it's like actually warming people. Oh, yes.
SPEAKER_07And it's it kicks off some heat. It's kind of crazy.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and it's also cool if you're like, you know, a couple samples deep and they let you crank that fire, you feel powerful. That's a powerful feeling.
SPEAKER_01I might have spent some time last year just kind of standing and watching some of the guys operating those things because they were having their own happy fun times where they would like set it off purposely to kind of like alarm someone when they walked by. And then they were letting people come up and like participate in it. Like they seem to be enjoying themselves as much as anybody else there. Yeah, we're really excited to have them back. They're back all the time. They love doing it. That's really cool. Are the motocross people gonna be back again?
SPEAKER_02We won't be having motocross people. Just some scheduling stuff happened. And with the um consolidation of the event space, they take up a rather you're gonna lose a lot of real estate. Yeah, and so with that being closed, we also lost that lane that's dedicated to the food trucks. Um, so the food trucks will also be on the midway. So you know, we had, you know, there's just with the scheduling and then this the space and the logistics of it, we just had to make the decision that the motocross just won't be back this year. But we'll have them again next year once Coliseums open up again and we could run as normal.
SPEAKER_07What are uh you you talked earlier about feedback? What are some of the what are the some of the things that the crowd and and people like, hey, you should bring this back that you're like, well, I don't know. It's like that was so long ago, or would that still be a thing?
SPEAKER_02Um, there's what a couple of like when the festival is like really in its heyday, people always ask for live music. They really, really want live music. For doobie, uh, it's like a live music galore. I book like 32 bands, and you know, it's live music all the time. Winter's a bit more difficult just because of the climate. As someone who plays musical instruments, the cold will do a number on your guitar strings and it'll keep it out of tune. The logistics of keeping a stage heated while people play is really difficult. And we found that it was logistically better, and more people seem to engage with it if we just stuck with a DJ. But we always get the emails about live music. We want live music, we want live music. And you know, there's no shortage of bands in the really, you know, local scene here in Minneapolis. It's just hard because like if people are like, we want to do it, and I'm like, okay, cool. Are you would you be open to playing outside in February? And they're like, no, not at all. And it's like, all right, cool. You no problem. There's that, and then we've had some other installations um with inflatables that people are interested in. It's just another cold thing. Like this event, the logistics stuff, like really does come down to temperature and climate. And why we also do snow sculptures, like Dusty will be back this year to do snow sculptures. But that literally is we know whether or not Dusty will be there like the day before. Oh, sure.
SPEAKER_07Just because like I remember the one year it was like damn near 40 degrees, and the whole like every brewery on that like lower end, it kind of slopes. There was like a swamp. Yeah, and I remember people are like shoveling wood chips because it was like it was like so muddy. I'm like, how do you yeah?
SPEAKER_02And that's like that's the event coordinators like you know, like every year at Pride, it rains, and we just have to get used to that. That's right, that's true. We just have to get used to it. We have to figure out a way. So we're changing locations this year for the Pride Dabbler to the turf field right next to the baseball field we operate on. Oh, cool. That'll be good. Literally, well, it'll solve us so much problem on mud. I I had to throw away boots that I love.
SPEAKER_07Oh, I was like, every time I was like walking so slowly, I'm like, I do not want to be the guy who biffs it in the on the mountain. Yeah, that'll be good.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but so much of it really is weather dependent, you know. And like that's nothing new for Minnesotans is figuring out like how are we gonna deal with the weather. We don't run from it, we deal with it.
SPEAKER_01If you move to the turf, this is gonna be the year that it doesn't rain. Probably, yeah, probably. I guarantee it.
SPEAKER_07And that's okay, that'll be fine. That'll be that'll be nice.
SPEAKER_01That's just how that works. You guys published your list of breweries participating. Yes. I think I saw it yesterday. It's a good list.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we're very excited. It's great because like a lot of we have a few newer breweries, so this is their first time, and then we have a lot of returning people, and they're just good friends of ours. And like this event for me now, after being at it for three years, it's just like every year it feels like I know more and more people at the event, or I recognize the same people. And so it's just like a nice like you just hang out with your friends all the time. And so we're excited about the the breweries coming out, we're excited about some good beer, we're excited to blow up some steam with everything going on with some good beer.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, you know, that'll be nice.
unknownYes.
SPEAKER_07I'm gonna I'm gonna blow up a lot of steam. Yes, please.
SPEAKER_01You had a good chunk of out of state, like there were obviously a lot of Minnesota breweries that were on the list, but you had some like dischutes out in Bend, Oregon. You had a bunch of them from the Boston area that are coming in. How did you make how did those connections happen? How did they decide, like, oh yeah, Minnesota in February? That's a great idea.
SPEAKER_02It's it's it's funny. And this is really where the distributor partners come in like clutch. So so many of our smaller local breweries are self-distributed, they're delivering their beers and themselves, like they deliver the beer themselves here to the Dablo Depot. But with the fact that we have, you know, really solid distribution networks here in the Twin Cities, mostly because there's a really high demand for craft beer and not just craft beer in Minnesota, but everywhere else, you're able to go to a brewery and say, like to shoots and be like, we would like you to show up. And then they can just go, yeah, our distributors there, they'll handle the staffing, they'll handle everything, and they'll handle being like our ambassador almost at the event. Like with Boston Beer Co., you know, with um, you know, Sam Adams and Dogfish Head and all of that. It's it's just through the distributor. They show up in force and I put them on one big line, and it they're able to have a representation here. And so these and as someone from the East Coast, particularly near Delaware, seeing Dogfish Head at a Minnesota brewery thing is like really awesome.
SPEAKER_07Is Megan still the I know Megan Megan is Megan is not.
SPEAKER_02No, she she's since left, and uh she's I don't know what she's doing right now. She actually worked here at the Dabbler on the in-between for a hot second, and then she moved on towards something else here.
SPEAKER_07I've known her for years. I met her at the beer classes I did through BBSU. And then she's like a neighbor, so we can go way back. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01You also had on the list, I tried to point this out to Dan. We we've had our eye on a brewery in River Falls that someone recommended to us because they do um it's like a bike shop and brewery combined. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I saw that the garage was on your list. So, Dan, we're going to see them. Yeah. And we're going to become great friends with them.
SPEAKER_07I hope so.
SPEAKER_02They're very sweet. Um, this was like their first, they reached out, they're like, We've never done this before. Like, how do you do it? And I was like, I will happily walk you through the process of signing up and getting everything situated and all of that. And they're they're excited. I'm ready to have them. They'll be, you know, flat center in the northern row of the midway. So look out for them. They'll have their branded tent and everything like that. They're they're stoked. I was really excited to see them. Who are you excited about on the list? Um, for me, it's crazy. Oh, hot take, or not a hot take, but surprise, I'm actually sober. That's even better. I knew that. Okay, yeah, I knew that. Drink anymore. I like my 2024 Winter Dabbler and 2020, yeah, and 2024 Pride Dabbler was the last dabbler I consumed alcohol at. And I've been sober ever since. Congratulations. Thank you, thank you. For me, I have a really good relationship with Wandering Leaf Brewing. I love those folks. And every time I see them there, and they're just always having a good time. And I for me, no understanding that this is also like a big marketing thing for these for these breweries, seeing them get a big line, knowing where they started is always like, yes, there we go. There we go. I love that. You know, there's that. And then um, I when I first moved to Twin Cities, I moved down the block from Arbiter Brewing Co. Yeah. And I've just been a fan of theirs ever since. Every time I see it, I just go, I used to be by you guys. I miss y'all. Like, you know, so those are the ones that I'm really excited about. Uh Deschutes, I'm excited about because I they make this NA porter that I love, and I will be rushing over there to see if we've got any for me.
SPEAKER_07A question I have about, you know, you mentioned NA. That's becoming a bigger deal to a lot more people. Yeah. How does that like how is it easy to get a brewery to commit to bringing an NA thing, or how does that work? Because I know it's kind of expensive if people are going through A B V and different things. Like, how do you do that?
SPEAKER_02Um, so for me, um, like Brewhaven has like a really good NA selection, primarily in. Their like NA like mind, like mushroom-y drinks and stuff like that that I really enjoy. There's never a problem getting them. But like if it's part of like their repertoire that they're a little bit known for, it's never difficult. Like you don't usually even have to ask them to bring it, they'll usually just bring it because they know it's good marketing for them to have that beverage there to offer it. I like when breweries bring NA beverages to their tent. We while we have our NA tent that's dedicated and it's it's you know, usually sponsored and it has all these NA goodies that people can drink and enjoy. I like it at the tent so that people who don't drink can also go tent to tent and try stuff out and things like that. Because it's getting more popular, there's definitely a little bit more ease of seeing it. Because I never require it, you know, just because you know, I do have it at a designated tent where people can safely consume it without worrying about maybe any cross-contamination or being served something that is an alcoholic. But it's becoming easier and easier. Um, it's also becoming a little bit easier just to find NA beverage groups who want to participate in a beer festival because they understand that there is going to be a market that people do participate in dry January or beer drinkers are choosing to drink non-alcoholic beer at times. Like if they've been drinking a lot of alcoholic beer, they might take a weekend where they just drink Trail Pass by Sierra Nevada or something like that. And so we have Yurba Madre showing up to serve Yurba Mate like cans for people to try it and you know, all of that. So they're seeing a lot of crossover. We don't have any THC at this event. Um, fairgrounds regulations on THC and all of that. Oh, sure. But you know, if that ever changes, we will have plenty of breweries who have THC that they're going to want to pedal. Like, I'm kind of have you heard a lot of that?
SPEAKER_07Like, can can you get THC there?
SPEAKER_02I have to like on the sign-up sheet, I do have to make like a caveat, like before someone even signs the sign-up. Like, hey, by the way, like this is the policy. Like, if you want to bring anything cannabinoid related, it needs to be CBD topicals, and they're only allowed to smell it, they're not allowed to put it on their body. Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_07Interesting.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, that's good to know. Yeah, but that's also why we have breweries participating a lot in doobie because they can show up, and while they might not be able to sample alcohol, they can certainly sample off their THC, you know? Yeah. I missed Duby last year. Did you go?
SPEAKER_07I didn't go, no. That's in the fall, right?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's the first weekend of September. Oh, that's there's there's literally so much. I mean, you teach, so I'm not doing anything.
SPEAKER_07That's like the saddest weekend of the year. Like, oh, back to work.
SPEAKER_01I remember getting like a little coupon at Winter Dabbler for Doobie Dabbler.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's growing. Um, we're still trying to work out all the kinks on it and what's going on.
SPEAKER_07That's down in Shockby.
SPEAKER_02Seivers Farms. Okay, that's right. Okay. It's nice because it's like it's like an adult like fall fest. Yeah. You know, like you can sit there and get I and ride a giant slide or ride a hay ride or and see a live music. Yeah, and we're going.
SPEAKER_07That's kind of interesting. We're going this year.
SPEAKER_08Well, yeah, we'll see.
SPEAKER_02We see some we've seen some wild things at DV Downers.
SPEAKER_07I bet. I bet. Yeah, that's interesting. What's so I'm curious from year to year, what's the how how many, what percentage of breweries changes from from year to year from your brewery list? Is there like a waiting list to get in? Because obviously you're kind of landlocked, or yeah, you know, you got to cut it off somewhere. How how many breweries do you can you safely?
SPEAKER_02I can get quite a bit of breweries. We're typically at the like 120 mark.
SPEAKER_08Okay.
SPEAKER_02And we we've never had to cap it. We've been comfortably at the 120 mark for a number of years now. And and we still have space for more. Like if it's day of and someone's like, Can I be there? I showed up, I'd be like, uh off the top of my head, yeah, booth 13 is empty. Go, go, go, it's over there. You know, it's we have plenty of space. It's it's you know, there is limitations in the way that the tents are, but because the midway is so big, we can shape the tents quite a bit. Um, but yeah, 120 is usually the number that we get. Most of the time, the only time we see people not participate in dab in the winter beer dabbler, we always we always have a wait list for pride. We because it's a very hot spot. But for winter, the only reason we might see a brewery not return is um one, they might have a staffing problem. It's just difficult sometimes to get people to get to that event. And if they can't, you know, if everyone's already manning the tap room that day, it doesn't make sense to like send you know the people manning the tap room close the tap room to go to an event sometimes. Unfortunately, the other and frankly, more common just in this day and age is the brewery just closed, you know. Like they might have closed down and you know, we they're not gonna be a participant, or something might have happened with a distributor and they can't, you know, get their beer there and stuff like that. So that's usually why we see, you know, people not participating. But you know, we try to keep it. I mean, I send the same invitation to everyone. I want as many breweries there as possible. I want someone to try a stout, walk over, drink a cold lager, and then walk over and drink a cheeseburger IPA. That's in that order, like that point works for me. Yeah. Those sampling, I've seen some people, I'm like, have you washed your sampling glass out at all? Like during this event? Because some of them I'm like, that's gross.
SPEAKER_07A little gnarly.
SPEAKER_01I mean, usually, usually someone does that for me before they pour into it. And I really like those. I like those booze.
SPEAKER_07That was one of the funny things about when when it was so cold, though, like all the foam froze, and it was just like this.
unknownOh no.
SPEAKER_07Weird-shaped, weird-colored, like frosty slush. It's like, what's in here? Yeah, it was beer gelatin. It was very weird. It was like beer aspic. You know what I mean? Um, yeah, that was that was strange.
SPEAKER_01All right. Another favorite part for me about any of these beer festivals, and I I almost it caused some heart palpitations when I walked into Winterbeer Dabbler last year. I had been told about the snackes. Yeah. I had this like image in my mind of what snackes were gonna be. And before before I even got to like the the entryway, I saw a guy that was all bundled up in his snowsuit and he had this big giant snacklace on that was full of all kinds of meat and cheese and pretzels. Yeah. And I like pulled him aside immediately. He's like, Oh my god, can I talk to you about your snackless?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01But the whole the whole day I was maybe stalking people around the ground so I could get pictures of their snack.
SPEAKER_04Stalking people. That's okay.
SPEAKER_02I was I was straight up stalking people. Yeah, I do the snacklesses thing. Uh, again, like I come from a part of the country where brewing isn't like crazy big, there's not a lot a whole lot of festivals, but the snackless is like a uniquely Minnesota thing from what I've seen, because it's like a loophole for getting food onto the fan grounds. Totally. It's why like some years I've had like food vendors be like, you need to ban snacklesses, it's gotten into our bottom line. And I'm like, I literally can't. It's a loophole. Good lord, it's a loophole. Like, I I I'm sorry, I can't change state fair policy. I am but one 27-year-old who works for a small business. Like, it's a loophole. Like, but dude, I've seen crazy, I've seen entire rotisserie chickens on a state.
SPEAKER_07I was just gonna say, I was gonna throw out the challenge for you this year, Courtney. You need a Cornish game in on your or don't came at all. That's putting it out there. And you can see when you come to the beer dadler and you look for Courtney, if she doesn't have a roasted bowl hanging on her jacket, well, you know, she washed out.
SPEAKER_02It's crazy, like slices of pizza. I've seen like mozzarella sticks, which is like that's that's sick.
SPEAKER_01I love mozzarella, but it's like did they also have like a little dipping sauce to get back?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, well really like craziness. I've seen I've seen so much from just like, okay, well, I gotta keep walking. Like, there's things to do, but like I just watched a full seven-course meal walk by. It's amazing. Yeah, it the ingenuity knows no bounds. Yes.
SPEAKER_07Well, the nice thing at the winter dabbler is you can do like beef sticks and they won't um ruin your shirt like what happened to me.
SPEAKER_01I was gonna say, the guy who constantly reminds me about how he ruined a shirt with beef sticks is telling me to wear a Cornish game hand.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, but it's winter. You wouldn't do that in the summer, but winter time because there's no meat sweats, there's no sweaty meat on your yeah, it was just uh it's the optimal thing for cheese, beef, Cornish game hands, whatever you whatever you want.
SPEAKER_02My sister, my sister in Maryland, I'm from Maryland originally. My sister in Maryland is like, she's talking about coming to go to this with her boyfriend. They've never been. She's like, I want to bring steamed blue crabs hanging from my snack list. Just like that would be so cool. If she does that, I need a picture. I was like, you can, I was like, first of all, I don't know where you're gonna source the crabs.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, she's gonna have to bring them in or carry on.
SPEAKER_02I was like, you're just gonna have to like, I don't know how this is gonna work, but I believe in you. But yeah, do it, do it. Cover it in old bay, bring a mallet and all that, like you know, wear your wear your eyes cat and be like, how about them edoes, you know, like go through and just like I support it. You should do it.
SPEAKER_05That's great.
SPEAKER_02If anyone shows up with like fresh blue crab for me, like if my sister does not pull through, yeah, I'll give you a ticket to the Pride Beer to have one. Yeah, yeah, we'll do it. All right, game on. That's awesome.
SPEAKER_07And I wanted a Baltimorean accent along with it, you know, just classic like and if you want to match Courtney with her Cornish game head, go ahead and do that too.
SPEAKER_01Got lots of options. Maybe I don't know. I can't do the Cornish game head. That's too much.
SPEAKER_07Okay, especially not with that attitude. Wow. I mean, I guess there's like let's have a growth mindset here about what we can put on a snack.
SPEAKER_02You could be like a hipster with like tin fish. Oh man. The tin fish craze, do that, a couple sardines. Oh you'd clear up or you could do that. So you clear up the line, they'd smell you come and be like, all right, we need to get out of here. Drecker would clear up so fast that line.
SPEAKER_01I have never gotten to have one of their beers at a beer festival because their line is always too long. Dude, it's like it's we've thought about it, like the Drecker line.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Because I'm like, good for y'all. Like, good for y'all. Like y'all make good beer.
SPEAKER_07Also, you've got to put them in like a logistically like place where it's not gonna like yeah.
SPEAKER_02Part of us are like, do we just give them two locations, but then that's like a staff? We create a barrier for them in staffing. And so it's like, what do we do? You know, other than just I'm sorry your beer's so good. Yeah, you know, like that seems like the right reaction. Yeah, it's just like, all right, you know, that's just part of the fun. It's like, all right, where are we gonna get in Drekker line now or are we gonna go around first?
SPEAKER_01But you earned that good beer by waiting in that line.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, you know, it's they make good stuff.
SPEAKER_07What are some of the food vendors you're gonna have this year?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I'm gonna have some classics that are, you know, usually there, like my pretzel guys, my pierogi guys, and stuff like that. But um, right now I have a lot of what is it, Hispanic food and a lot of Asian food. Oh, nice and stuff like that. You know, that was a little bit purposeful with everything going on. I want to make sure that that's represented. But like for me, selfishly, I want to eat a taco after the end of the beard ablet and stuff like that. So we got some donut vendors, like mini donut vendors as well. It's the fairgrounds.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, last year I had the cheese curd tacos for the switchies. Oh my lord. That's I think where we ran into each other. I was really because I was gonna go to I didn't make it to the Coliseum because I ran into you guys by the food trucks. Yeah, that was oh god, that's I've you know, I've written things about those cheesecried tacos. Cheesecrudd tacos in my special time uh food journal that nobody gets to see, but it's really exciting stuff. Yeah, those are good. I'm assuming Potter's is gonna be there.
SPEAKER_02Potters won't be.
SPEAKER_07Um and that's a that's a that's a good wintertime beer festival snack.
SPEAKER_02It's awesome. It's more of a uh I can't go into it too much, but it's just an issue with the fair specifically. Okay. So the getting a food vendor on site is actually quite a bit of a lengthy licensing process. Oh, interesting with the fair, because you might have a Minnesota Department of Health license, you might have a food service license for St. Paul or Minneapolis, but to operate on the fairgrounds, oh, because it's like its own entity, yeah, dude. It's like you need to be licensed with the fairgrounds and you need to, you know, you need to provide them the proper documentation, you need to go through their process and stuff like that. And sometimes it just doesn't work out. Okay, you know, and so like that's the tricky part where you're like, I I want this food vendor there, I want this food vendor there, but if they don't play ball with the fair, my venue, it can be a bit of a challenge getting them in there and stuff like that. So I I usually overbook food trucks because I have the anticipation that some of them might either not want to jump through all the hoops, it might be too much work for them, or they actually don't get approved. Okay, you know, and you know, the fair has the right to do that. They look at their health stuff, they look at their history and things like that. And most of the time, anytime I've had been called by my rep at the fair and they're like, we can't have this food vendor here, he explains why I go, Okay, yeah, that makes sense. Like for the integrity of the event and food safety, yeah, we're not gonna have this person at the event. It's ever like we have a personal vendetta against Northeast pretzels, they cannot come into the festival. It's just like, you know, they're just too good. They're just too good.
SPEAKER_07They distract from everything.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_07What is the so from year to year, what is the logistical thing? Like, what's the best thing you've learned in your three years of doing events? What's the thing that you're like at first, you're like, God, this how do we solve this problem? And now you're like, ah, I can't believe I ever thought this was tricky.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I I think when I first started, the anxiety about missing something, you know, as you're learning, yeah, there's like that I don't know what I don't know, like at all. You know, I'm going to, I know first accepting that you're probably gonna miss stuff because you simply don't have the knowledge in your brain to recognize it's a thing you need to do. But now that I've done it, you really start to get your priorities in in a row. You also learn to multitask on events. So in the process of signing people up for one event, I might also send them the sign up for an event that might be the within a year from now. Yeah. But by the time I get to that event, I've already saved myself a bunch of time on that. Um, but the one thing uh also straight up is just having the right communication with your team. Um on the event site, like this stuff has been done now for 16 years. There's a method to this. Like Matt and his crew and my on-grounds producer have done this before. They do it every year, they know exactly how it's gonna go. I've done this now for three years, I know how a lot of it's gonna go. I know that every year I'm probably gonna have a new face on the team in some way, whether they just be one of our part-timers at the liquor store or coming to the event to help out, or if I've booked another contractor to run my front gate rather than one I've usually used. Being able to communicate effectively what this thing is gonna look like before they get there solves so many problems. Cause when, you know, when you get to a thing that you've never been to before, it's that same like knowledge gap. You're like, oh, well, I don't freaking know what's going on. I don't know where that is. And just like trusting that, like we all say to each other when we start the event, like, all of us are going to be mean to one another today, probably at some point. And just being like, let that roll off the shoulder. It's not, it's not personal. I'm just really stressed. Someone might have four people might have just called me on the radio at the same time. You might have just lost your phone, you know, or for some reason the Wi-Fi box for all of our scanners stopped working, or maybe it's so cold that the Wi-Fi or the uh ticket scanners aren't working at all and the battery's draining all the way. Maybe you lost a camera lens, or maybe this vendor hasn't shown up in time, or we're 10 minutes out from opening the front gate and no one can find the designated driver wristbands, you know. Like none of this stuff has actually happened, though, right? No, no, that's never spitball on here. And then, like, like that's like the big thing. The other thing is just like organizing the event leading up to it. I was lucky enough to follow in the footsteps of Jillian Hiscock, who is one of the most organized people I've ever met in my entire life. She is a gem, absolute gem. And realizing that she created systems of signing up and organizing stuff that did a lot of the work for her. So, like automated forms that will auto-populate your spreadsheets, you know, saving yourself on that work so you can always find it, and then it always has a copy of everything is really good. Comparing to last year, maybe what you spent, what vendor was there, all that stuff. You know, once you know, once the map is basically set in stone and this thing is gonna look like the way it is, you can really start doing the fun stuff of like, well, what if we try this? Or we, you know, all that stuff.
SPEAKER_01There might be an extra challenge this year. We have some unwelcome guests in the Twin Cities. How are we dealing with that at the the Dabbler? Is that a concern? Is it something that you've prepared for?
SPEAKER_02Um, I mean, it's to be frank, like this whole situation in the Twin Cities with Operation Metro Surge, um, you know, the presence of ICE and Border Patrol, the kind of political lens that's been like focused on our like we're we're in the news all the time, has been really difficult for small businesses. And that includes breweries, it includes here at the liquor store. I mean, our team for the festival side of things is like only four people. We're a small business. But from a consumer perspective, like people aren't thinking about, you know, what plans they're gonna make by the end of the month. They're thinking about what's happening right now in front of them. It's been difficult, just like it was for COVID. You know, COVID was really difficult on small businesses, and it's feeling like we're feeling the same kind of uh economic and social pressure about like what do we do? What's going on? But for us, my chief concern is safety at the event. Um, my chief concern is that everyone feels welcome and has dignity in the fact that they're welcomed. It's not enough just to invite them to the table, but if they don't feel dignified while sitting there, it's you've wasted you've wasted that invitation. So for us specifically, um there's good news. Working and operating on the state fair grounds and the fact that it's a private ticketed event gives us a lot of freedom to deny entry and things. We, you know, we have the right to say you're no longer allowed welcome at the event or not allowed in the event. The uh state fair police, after speaking with them, they don't cooperate with immigration's custom enforcement or border patrol. Um, the local police that off-duty officers and the local uh state troopers that are are off duty there as well do not cooperate with ICE or uh Border Patrol and my private security that we hire to kind of like be a presence in there. I've also told them that you know we're not going to be cooperating with Border Patrol or ICE in any of their operations. Um nothing short of a signed judicial warrant or within the expected amount of time that is valid and that I've seen with my own eyes will allow those guys on the festival grounds. This isn't about today, it isn't about like immigration politics. Today is about making sure everyone in the Twin Cities, no matter where you're from, can enjoy beer and can enjoy Minnesota and feel safe and dignified. I mean, you know, and I've had breweries reach out and ask the exact same thing, and you know, it's the same answer. Um, nothing short of a judicial warrant to be here. We'll get them in there. But it's a private event, and you have to have a ticket to be here, and I'm not gonna sell you one.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, good, good on you. That's that's nice to hear.
SPEAKER_01It's been it's been hard for me to wrap my head like I'm excited for the beer dabbler to be happening, but it also doesn't feel like a time to be excited about going out and having fun.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and you know, I've been thinking the same thing. Like I live in uptown Minneapolis, and it's as I was saying before we started recording, like this is a very real presence in my life, just going to and from work on the weekends, going to the grocery store. And as it is for many people in the Twin Cities and even our surrounding suburbs, for me, being the guy who plans a fun thing, it kind of feels like what am I doing? Like, I'm throwing a party right now. Yeah, you know, luckily here at the depot, we've partnered with Potter's Passy to do passies for protesters, where we just it's like every day now we're like feeding people at protests and all of that stuff. I mean, we've always had a pretty big stance on inclusion here at the company as evident. Like we have Rainbow Wall over by our macro beer here in the liquor store. So like we, you know, if you want to buy Bud Light, you gotta be by a rainbow flag type of thing. Um, but you know, it is like with the community, like for us right now, so much of us have been at protests, so much of us have been at vigils, so much of us have been delivering groceries or collecting groceries or doing monetary deposits. Like at some point to keep the momentum going, yeah, steam needs to be let off, you know. Like I and I encourage people, like find a way to like at least rest a little bit. Like when this all started, I was not sleeping well, and I know a lot of people weren't sleeping well and it affected my work and all of that. And like, dude, just find a way if you can for four hours drink yourself silly on craft beer and shoot fire into the air and challenge accepted. Yeah, challenge accepted. I mean, you know, we've been talking a lot about this kind of neighborism here in Minnesota, you know, and for me, Dabbler is so Minnesota, and every year I do this, I meet a new neighbor in the brewing industry. What I would hope for this beer dabbler is for people to show up and enjoy the beer, but also start talking to people a little bit more, getting to know each other. And this is like more of a community, like we're together, this is what we do. We're cold, we're drinking beer, and we love each other because this is Minnesota. You know, it's why I moved here, it's why I'm gonna stay here forever. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07Even though there's no blue crabs.
SPEAKER_02I can handle it. I can handle it. I can I can get my fix. That means he likes it because it's I was like telling my dad, I was like, I'm not a Marylander anymore. Glory to my country, Minnesota.
SPEAKER_01You know, that's what happens. It is, it is.
SPEAKER_02It's you guys are contagious people. I love it.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, well, I mean, I think a lot of what you said is like most Minnesotans are pretty decent, like pretty decent people. They make good neighbors, yeah. You know, like that's that's nice. It's not like that everywhere, yeah.
SPEAKER_01So but I think this has taken it to a whole new there's a whole new level of good neighborism that's happening. Yeah, and it's been really heartening to see like the the craft beer community itself, all of the different breweries. It's it's hard for me. I I can think of some, but there's a very short list of breweries that I know of that are not doing something right now in terms of donations and gathering supplies to to donate to places. They're all trying to do whatever they can to help people right now. And I it's it's so nice to see.
SPEAKER_02It is huge. It's kind of like how a brewery functions. Like when I got here and I realized how it functioned in each neighborhood, you know, as the spot. Yeah, you know, as that third place for people to gather and stuff like that. Like, I think for most brewery owners and most of the brewery owners I know, helping the community during this was just like, yeah, that's just what we do. Those are my people. Yeah, this is as natural to us as making beer. Yeah, you know, and so you know, there's nothing more neighborly than like sharing beer with people, you know. You know, think of this as like the big garage that you all sit in as you drink beer and stuff like that. Like, yeah, but it's just the midway of the stairs. Now I like that.
SPEAKER_07People can buy tickets. Are there do you want to speak a little bit about the types of tickets that are available to buy?
SPEAKER_02Yeah, there's two types of tickets. Um, right now we have our general admission ticket, uh, which gets you in at two o'clock and runs you through the rest of it, or you can come in early with Early access gets you in an hour early, and you'll enjoy less lines. Um, you'll enjoy less crowds, and you'll be able to really like that's a good way if you want to drink some Drakker beer.
SPEAKER_07You get that early access, I think that's like the only way. Yeah, I think that's the only way to do the winter dabbler, just because like the lines do get really long. And if you really want to, if there's certain places you're excited about, or if there's like a special beer that they're tapping at a certain time, I think you gotta get the early access.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, GA runs you $55 and uh early access is fifteen dollars more at 70. And the way I think about it is that's a bar tab right there. You know, if for a lot of places, especially now. I mean yeah, that's like yeah, it's like with inflation, like um that's a bar like 55 bucks is a bar tab for you in a date going out. And so it's like, but you don't get unlimited beer with that bar tab, you know? You don't get no you don't fix that. Yeah, we gotta find a way to fix that. So that's like the way I'm like, you if you're going out on a Saturday anyway, you would have spent this anyway and gotten less. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Well, and you also have a designated driver ticket available, right?
SPEAKER_02We have a $20 designated driver ticket available. Um, you know, that's the people who will enjoy a lot of our NA beverages and things like that. And that's one way we can guarantee that people can get home safe. You know, these are the like the troopers out there who will like, I mean, I've been this friend who's like following the crowd as they go from tent to tent, making sure everyone's safe, phones are charged, bags are picked up. You didn't, if you dropped a mitten, they're picking it up. But we're also working with Metro Transit to have free rides for our folks that go around. And then, you know, we have an Uber drop-off system that we have at the state fair right on the Snelling entrance.
SPEAKER_07That the the you mentioned battery running out on your phone that happened to me. Uh it was the 20, it was the it was like the 2020 one, I think. I was like going to call an Uber and my phone died. Oh no, and I'm like, well, I guess I'm walking home. So I live over in like Como Park.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07And I was like, that was the that was the year it was like really warm. So it was like, and then everything was freezing. So the walk back down Larpender was just absolutely horrible. Because I was like overheating and slipping all at the same time. And I went into that Jimmy John's over there. I'm like, if I buy a sandwich, can I use a charger? Like, yeah, sure, come on in. Like, thank God. Thank God I wasn't gonna make it.
SPEAKER_02I mean, that's like the phone charge thing, like that's the one like tip. I'm like, you really need to make sure your phone is charged because at the end of the cold is gonna drain that battery. I bring two different portable chargers on events state. One, because everyone calls me, right? As vendor loading happens, I'm getting called all the time. And I tell people in this in the load information, do not call me, do not call me. Text me, I'll probably see it. But if everyone's calling me at once, I just can't do anything. But yeah, do that phone dying, because like I've been at events, I walked, I live in uptown, and I walked to northeast Minneapolis to my friend's house from the state fair because my phone died, and I just didn't know what to do.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, that's rough. Yeah, so yeah, bring it, bring that, bring an extra charger battery, bring hand warmers. What are some other logistical things? Obviously, the Cornish game hand around your neck.
SPEAKER_02Um, please drink water. We have water trailers. That is like water trailers. It's free. Yeah, it's free water trailers filled with multiple kegs of water. We will not run out. We want you to drink it. Oh my gosh, do I want you to drink water? And then also surprisingly, sunblock on your face. Yeah. Like we might be in, it might be winter, but please put sunblock on your face. And then another, this is pro tip from a guy who walks the length of the event like 11 times. If you can find a way to bring an extra pair of socks that you can change into on your drive back, it's the best feeling in the world. Happy feeling.
SPEAKER_07Oh, that's a good idea.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, you just bring like an extra, it doesn't even have to be wool socks, just new socks. Any new sock. Okay. You take it off and you put it on when you're on your way, either when you're waiting for your Uber or any like right at the end of the event. That's a good idea. Game changing. I like that.
SPEAKER_07Now I know that you've done like uh they used to do wristbanding things. Is that still a thing, or do they does that all happen? Because I know Stouts was a popular gathering spot before that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, so we'll do Stouts, Tipsy Steer, and then Gabe's as well. They'll be doing our pre-ristbanding locations. So you can go there, you know, get your wristband on, and that way you save yourself a little bit of time as you're going through the front gate. You know, we you know, that is like the biggest bottleneck of the event, is just the front gate. And so we want to get people through there as quickly as possible.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. And it's did we say when it is?
SPEAKER_02It's February 21st.
SPEAKER_07February 21st.
SPEAKER_02You can buy tickets at beardablo.com.
SPEAKER_07Okay.
SPEAKER_01Don't find it. Follow you on social media?
SPEAKER_02You do, yeah.
SPEAKER_01No, like where can people follow you on social media? Oh, yeah. You can follow. I was like, me personally, me personally.
SPEAKER_07If she's stalking the snackless people, she's definitely following you on social media.
SPEAKER_02We are definitely more prevalent on meta platforms. Um, so Facebook and Instagram are gonna see like the most news. You can also subscribe to our newsletter on our website, but you can find us just at Beer Dabbler, you know, uh on Instagram or Facebook. Okay.
SPEAKER_01And this is actually the first time I've been over to the liquor store.
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah, or Dabbler Depot here on West Sevens. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_07It's a great, it's a very, very nice liquor store experience because I don't think I've ever seen any place that has this much cooler space. Yeah, we have a lot of cooler space. Crazy.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, a lot of cooler space, um, a lot of wines. Our goal here was to pro give people options that weren't like the major name brand options, but would also fit the, you know, oh, I really like Captain Morgan. It's like, oh, cool. Have you tried this rum before? You know, it's around the same price point, same flavor profile, but a little bit higher quality. And then obviously the cooler space for the beer, it's like we're running out because we buy so much beer. I mean, the THC has grown quite a bit. We've had to add two extra doors for our THC door, and our macro section seems to be shrinking as our craft beer section seems to be increasing. Um, but we got cool things like a live plant wall that uses the recycled water of the coolers to water itself. Oh, nice. Yeah, that's really cool.
SPEAKER_07I've never really I've been sitting here kind of looking up. It's like, oh, that's really neat. Yeah, very calming.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's uh yeah, massive solar panels on the roof. So we kind of have like a middleman between the sun and our plants, um, bringing for our grow lights, and then all of the water and the condensation made by our coolers is recycled through the system to water all the plants. Oh, that's really cool. We got a massive Wheel of Fortune wheel, and then we have a tap wall as well for a lot of our local beers so that people can try a little bit and dabble a little bit. Branding people come together. Yeah, so like I mean, we we also have bottles behind the shelf if people want to try spirits or anything like that. And like all of our staff here is passionate about at least one section of the store, and we'll talk ear off about it for hours if you let them.
SPEAKER_07Okay, here's a just a this might be a dumb question. What is the I've I've seen places that have bottles behind, like, what is the etiquette for that? Like, what's the like the same reason why you know you go into an ice cream place and they're like samples available? There's always one ass clown who wants to try all the things and is like, will you relax? You're this is meant to be you're trying to decide between whether one or the other.
SPEAKER_02If you're thinking between two, okay.
SPEAKER_07Like if like okay, that's what I was like, that's what I assumed was the the yeah, like property.
SPEAKER_02I like tequila, I think tequila's great, and people are trying to get into tequila. And so if we have a couple bottles around the same price point and they're just trying to figure out if they want an onyeho or maybe just like a regular Blanco, I'll pour them that. But if it then becomes like, oh, well, can I try that whiskey too? And I go, Well, can I show you it on the shelf? You're like, nah, it's like go down to Bennett's buddy. It's like that, it's like, okay, you're clearly taking advantage of this. And then two, it's like, dude, you're not gonna get drunk off samples. Like, I'm not gonna let you do that at a liquor store. Yeah, that's insane. That's insane. You're here to try it, maybe spit it and go, okay, yeah, I will follow through with that purchase.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, yeah. You do have a really nice selection of spirits. There's a lot of different stuff. I mean, a great selection and everything, but I've I've been pretty impressed with like all your different bourbons and stuff.
SPEAKER_02I've seen stuff here that our buyer, wow, he's doing such a good job. Yeah, yeah, we love that guy.
SPEAKER_01I've been trying not to look out there. Oh, you should walk around and circle. I'm gonna look around when we're done, but I didn't want to be like looking out here while we were talking because I'm oh, that label looks interesting.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I mean, yeah, this was like I remember when I walked in for my interview, I was like, whoa, whoa. Yeah, yeah, it's a cool spot.
SPEAKER_07Who does the art for your poster? Every year the poster is a little different, it's always really cool.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we um we did Dave Witt this year. Okay, yeah, he's historically done most of our our poster art. Okay. For Jordan and I, when we were looking at the marketing for it, we kind of wanted to do like a return to form. You know, with the Coliseum closing, it felt like a little bit like of a refresher. This is gonna be a little bit different, and we can go back to basics and stuff like that. With the way things are going with the beer industry, we thought, like, let's just celebrate beer, recognize that this is the reason we're all here. Burries need our support right now, let's return to form. So we went with the same artist that people are kind of like consistent, like his style is pretty synonymous with a lot of the beer dabbler like kind of marketing, just because he's done it for so long. He hand draws all it's so cool, it's really neat.
SPEAKER_07Yeah. Are you ever gonna bring back the cheese? Were you here for that? They did that for a couple years. So a coup for a couple years, the Coliseum was like this like a bunch of cheese. It was like all these cheese, like it was the coolest thing ever. Because you'd be like, go in there, warm up, and they also had like some of the bigger regional brands. Yeah, yeah, like so the they would all be in there, but then they're like if you walked around the concourse, there was all these like little cheese setups, you get little little samples of things, and you get like you know, it was amazing because I love cheese. Like, I fucked up the cheese, it was really, really cool.
SPEAKER_02I know why my Wisconsin ticket sales are down. Oh my gosh. Think about for next year. I'll think about that.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, which it was crazy. It was like, wow, this is great. And they had other stuff, like, but it was just like a neat display, and I you know, people were handing out cards, and so like some of them were like local creameries, and some some of them were like it was just like lunes and barely's. I think that's who sponsored it. Okay, so like it was really it was really fun, really different. Cheese, okay.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I'll try to bring that back. Yeah, so much of it is like sponsor dependent with with festivals. Um, and I didn't know going into it. I was like, oh, we can just do this, we can just do this, and then it's like, all right, there's a bill for the cheese. You're like, oh, that's right, I need lunch to put the bill for the cheese. So it's it's like people do ask a whole lot about like, are you gonna bring this back or is this gonna come back? And it's like, all right, well, yeah, we'll try. Um, a lot of it was sponsor dependent in the past, and yeah, that's just kind of how we think about it. But it is like we are getting to that point in the life cycle of this festival where we can start bringing things back and it feels new. Yeah, you know what I mean? Like we have enough new consumers who are coming through who are just like, oh, what the cheese? When did this is brand new to me, you know? So that's right.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, so then there's people like me. I remember when I was that excited. Well, I'm still excited. Move out of my way. Have you noticed? I know that after COVID, especially, but it even before COVID, it seemed like we were kind of getting a little bit of a festival fatigue. I'm curious to hear your thoughts on where we are with that now. Have you noticed a new, and maybe like like you just said, we're getting a new generation of people getting into festivals, but it seemed for a while that it was like there were festivals happening all the time and everybody was going, and then there was like we hit kind of a plateau, and then there was like a dip, and then COVID made it dip even more. And I feel like I know that in talking to other people who do festivals, is like the last couple years have definitely felt like a struggle.
SPEAKER_02It it's no secret that just events in general are uh difficult. Twin cities are a bit unique just because of the s seasonal aspect of some of this and stuff. Like when spring hits, like I was shocked at how quickly events would pop up everywhere. People are ready to do things and cabin fever, but just there's a general new kind of buying uh practice when it comes to tickets. And tickets really are the determining factor of like how this might play out with regards to like the festival. People want to go to events, people want to be engaged, people want to leave their homes and check things out, but people aren't always willing to buy a ticket to do it. They are like the free events that you know are put on by your local neighborhood stuff are definitely getting a lot more like foot traffic per like square footage than like your larger events and stuff like that. But the other thing we're really there's no momentum just in the way tickets are purchased and talked about. What happens is you have like a very dead sales period, and then it shoots up like day before the festival. Okay. And like the anxiety you will feel as an event person. I would hate that. I would hate that. You're sitting there going like, oh my gosh, like, oh my gosh, like we've only sold XYZ tickets, or like, oh my gosh, like things have been really good, but then they dropped off and they've been really good and it's all over the place. There's no rhyme or reason to it anymore.
SPEAKER_08Okay.
SPEAKER_02And so what that's done for events coordinators is they essentially have to operate in the dark. You know, if I don't know how many people are gonna be showing up to my event until like the day before, I have no idea how I ought to like prop, like really hone in on how this thing is set up.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, I just I'd be snorting Tums. I'd be having so much anxiety. That's crazy.
SPEAKER_02And that's just across the board. That's even for concerts, you know, that's for sports games, that type of thing. That's just across the board. People, it seems, post-COVID don't know what they're going to be doing two weeks from now, and they don't want to commit to anything. And you know, buying a ticket is a commitment in some way. And so, like, that's then the biggest thing. I I think there's like a loss of momentum just from the sense that like it's not a thing that's talking about until it's like the week of when everyone's buying it, when all your friends are like, I just bought tickets, you gotta go buy tickets to this and stuff like that. Yeah, and then it's a momentum, it's not like uh, oh the ticket, oh my gosh, guys, like it used to be like tickets are going on sale today, we need to get them, and I can't wait to be there, you know. There's that conversation that happens, or like I bought them when they went on sale. You got a month left, buy them, they're gonna sell out, you know. We just don't know anymore, you know.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, it's kind of interesting.
SPEAKER_02It's it's it's interesting. The fatigue, I don't know. I when it comes to beer, I know like I have new customers every year. I don't have a whole lot of like returning customers and stuff like that. And so what I could see sometimes, I have like diehards like yourself, you know, and like my big diehard beer fans who go to every beer festival all the time. This is like a real hobby thing, but I'm getting a lot more people who they've never done the beer thing before and they go it and they go back, it's not for me. Or like that was fun, and then they might forget about it. And then it's just like, and I what I want to do is hopefully capture them a little bit because then I need the culture to survive. Yeah, the culture around beer, the culture around you know, Minnesota beer lovers to survive, and we need to bring in new people like that. And it's just a it's a tough egg to crack. We don't we we at the beer dabbler, like we we think about it all the time, right? Like, what are how are we gonna keep these people coming back? How are we going to have this be a cultural thing that goes on and on and on and on? How do we get other people involved that might get other people excited about it? You know, that type of thing.
SPEAKER_01To be fair, I didn't know anything about these beer festivals until going to Winter Beer Dabbler. And again, it it changed everything. It was not, I don't know what I had in my head for what it was going to be, but it was so far beyond what I could imagine in such a good way.
SPEAKER_02I think there's I I read something um I forget where it was. It was on some beer um kind of magazine. I read it, and the people who are getting into the drinking age right now grew up with their parents taking them as kids to breweries. You know, these older millennial parents who really enjoyed the beer craze and still enjoy the beer craze, and they brought their kids. And now for the kids, instead of going to the breweries and thinking that this is a new exciting thing that they can try now that they're 21, they go, Oh, that's the thing mom and dad brought me to. That's what the article was talking about.
SPEAKER_07I have never heard that. That's fascinating.
SPEAKER_02And so, like, I speak with my my my friends come to the beer dabbler and I make them buy a ticket. It's like you better be buying a ticket, guys. You gotta support me. Yeah. Um, but they come and they love it, but they also know what it's about. I start talking to other people who've never been to beer for like beer festival, like they almost think it's like nerdy, or like you're gonna see guys with flannels and beards and like five-panel hats with like IPAs. And they're there. Oh, yeah. Don't get me wrong. They're there, but you'll also see a guy dressed up as a unicorn with like a big thing of salami tied around his neck. Yeah. And like, I think you know what I mean.
SPEAKER_07That should be the poster for next year. That might be me. You're gonna say somebody dressed. Please, I need that to be you. Yes, please.
SPEAKER_01And I think wait, it's a Cornish game head, not Salami.
SPEAKER_07Well, either way.
SPEAKER_02Um, the next poster will be you riding a Cornish game head to the beer dabbler. Yeah, you could AI that we'll make that happen. I think one of the reasons beer dabbler has stood the test of time compared to like other beer festivals when it was a bit crazy, is because we have the wackiness and like Jordan, our marketing guy, he will literally find the craziest photo he can find out of the thousands of photos he takes and be like, this will now be on all of our social media. Like, you know, you will see. We used to have this photo of our pride of like this really, really buff dude at Pride with like a rainbow like tank top, just riding a mechanical bull. And it was just like, Yeah, that's what we're gonna put out there. Like, that's what people need to see. Or we do find like every now and then you find like a guy who's like doesn't know how to dance, but he's dancing his heart out, and you get like the perfect shot of him, and you're like, that goes up there. Yep, you know.
SPEAKER_01So we it was just such a good time. The people watching, fantastic. Yes, the beer, fantastic. If you don't like beer, there's other beverages that you can enjoy while you're watching all of this stuff happening around you.
SPEAKER_02So yeah, we try to keep it as different as possible.
SPEAKER_07Because I do, yeah. After a while, it's like, okay, I'm done walking. I just want to meander and not in a lean up against the pet barricade as well. Well, yeah, I always wind up just like congregating at certain tents and just chatting and yeah, but isn't that like half the fun? Yeah, just I love it. And that's why I used to be like, no, I've got to get around to everybody. Now I'm like, you know, I'll try to get to people and take pictures at the beginning, and then I just want to socialize or like it's helpful for me. Like if I wanna there's usually a lot of people there, brewers and stuff. It's like just nice to have a lot of people in the same location just to touch space with. And it is nice.
SPEAKER_02All the brewers know each other, all the beer tenders there. It's a family reunion. It is like it is like a family reunion, absolutely. And like for me, that was electric when I was there. Yeah, I mean, sure, like I very rarely get to talk to people at the event because it'll be like, Sam, we have a problem over here, and it's like, all right, thanks, I'll be right over here. And as a man there's like, Sam, something is flooded over here, and it's like, all right, cool, I'll be right over. And you know, and I'm sprinting around on my golf cart trying to get to things and something like that.
SPEAKER_07Sam, is it legal to bring in a corner's game? There's a lady's name Courtney. Letter in, let her in.
SPEAKER_02We have a guy here with his dog. What should we do? And it's like, ah, this sucks. I want the dog here because I love dogs, but he also can't be here.
SPEAKER_07Dog would be freaked out. That would be yeah.
SPEAKER_02Well, you just let it get like it's like problem at the porta potties on the north end. Problem, Sam, we need to talk to someone. It's like, Sam, can you get security for the porta potties? Really bad. It's like, oh my gosh, what do I do? It's like, what am I gonna walk into?
SPEAKER_07Security and porta potties are two things I never want to hear in the same way.
SPEAKER_02I can talk to folks and be like, Are you having a good time? Like, how are you doing? It's like, God, this is why we do it. Yeah, this is why we do it.
SPEAKER_07Oh, that's cool.
SPEAKER_01I think this should be everyone's call to action to go get your ticket now. Please and help them. Don't wait till the day before, though. Let's dress.
SPEAKER_07Let's let's help Sam, you know, enjoy buy your tickets as soon as you hear this when it drops.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, if you haven't gotten them already. If if you bring me blue crabs on a snackless, we will put you on the next poster. Oh, yeah. Guarantee.
SPEAKER_07Guarantee.
SPEAKER_02We will we will I will get WCCO there to interview me how it felt after I see blue crabs on a snackless in Minnesota.
SPEAKER_07That's a pretty good deal.
SPEAKER_01All right, we've got a list of things we need to make happen at the beer dabbler this year.
SPEAKER_07Yeah, we gotta find some Cornish game hands, some blue crabs, all sorts of stuff. Unicorn. Unicorn, a mechanical bowl. I don't know.
SPEAKER_01Mechanical bowl.
SPEAKER_07Let's dream big. Let's dream big.
SPEAKER_01We can do all of this. One more time, Sam. Where can people find you and buy tickets for the winter beer dabbler?
SPEAKER_02They can find us uh on beardabbler.com and you can buy your tickets right there. Um, we have general admission going for $55, early access going for $70, and then we have uh designated driver going for $20. You can also follow us on social media at Beer Dabbler um across the board from X to Facebook to Instagram.
SPEAKER_01Even if you're not going to Beer Dabbler, you should toss a follow so you can see some of the great imagery that's going to come out of it.
SPEAKER_07You'll have severe FOMO and want to get more get tickets for the next event. Yeah. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01Dan, where can people find you?
SPEAKER_07If you just search up a one-pint stand, I'm on Instagram, Facebook, Blue Sky, Mastodon, TikTok. I got a great new episode. A lot of people have been excited about Dangerous Man. Yes. I interviewed the new Dangerous Man owner. That's awesome. There's a lot of fun reasons to be excited about Dangerous Man because they're gonna have a tap room.
SPEAKER_01Wait, do you talk about the tap room on the episode?
SPEAKER_07We he he gave some subtle hints.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_07But he said there will be a tap room and it will be in Northeast. So that's exciting. This is all exciting. Very exciting.
SPEAKER_01Well, I'm Courtney. You can find me at the BreweryAdventure on Instagram or thebreweryadventure.com. You can email me, Courtney at the BreweryAventure.com if you'd like to send me an email or send me a message.
SPEAKER_07That's a recipe for a Cornish game head that you were gonna wear on your necklace. That'd be helpful. Have you ever prepared a Cornish game head?
SPEAKER_01I have never prepared a Cornish.
SPEAKER_07They're tricky, they're fast. That's how you know you gotta sell that.
SPEAKER_01So this is gonna be a challenge all on its own.
SPEAKER_02I'm gonna release Cornish game heads into the first one.
SPEAKER_07What was that noise? Uh just the beer line acting out of the CO2.
SPEAKER_01Wait, can I just carry a live one? I don't care.
SPEAKER_07You do.
SPEAKER_01It's not a dog. Are Cornish game hands?
SPEAKER_07Just don't release it right by the flame thing. It'll be very dramatic.
SPEAKER_02Yeah at the festival.
SPEAKER_04That could be the couple weeks to figure this out. Yeah, perfect.
SPEAKER_00Excellent. Well, thank you, Sam, so much for joining us.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, thanks for taking time to chat.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely. Really got to be here.
SPEAKER_00We look forward to seeing you at the New Dabbler. Cheers. Cheers.
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